iowacrusader's Xanga

Commitment & Changes

Thu, 15 Nov 2007 22:00:40 GMT

I hate it. Commitment, that is. It's pretty obvious when I look at my life. Just don't tell my girlfriend. And while we're on the topic, we should probably talk about what has changed since March 11.

First. I am in college. In NYC. But I knew I would be here, so that isn't really a change.
Second. I got a job building trusses for houses over the summer. Didn't expect to do brute labor - I'm not really cut out for it. So a surprise.
Third. I met (and liked) a girl. Then she liked me. Now we are dating (and we like each other) And it was long distance, except she is moving to NY for spring semester. Which is a good thing. She even has a name - Alyse.
Fourth. I made a bunch of new friends in college. At the cost of most of my old friends. Of whom many were ironically enough not my friends. Ever. Or so it seems. But those of you who are/were -- here's looking at you.
Fifth. I'm in New York. Going to college. (This is worth another mention.)
Sixth. My computer has been broken for about six weeks. I have been without my own computer for the longest time since my parents took my HP Pavillon away for eight months in seventh grade. Long story. Hopefully God deigns it proper to return my laptop before eight months pass.
Seventh. I've only completed five or six books since the first week of summer. This is bad.
Eighth. I have developed an affinity for walking in front of cars, eating cereal, peanut butter sandwiches, and pasta, cursing tourists, flipping off taxis(only when it's raining), watching movies instead of doing homework, studying literally all day (in the 24 hr sense of the word), understanding the MTA map in the subway, and arguing about the fastest way to get to Battery Park from Columbus Circle.
Ninth. I still don't drink coffee. Not really a change, but worth mentioning.
Tenth. My favorite release is to stand on the roof of my apartment building, watching the city in the shadow of the Empire State Building, thinking about how I got here and about the future.

Maybe I'll have another nice list like this in a year. Hopefully. That's number eleven, actually. I'm a lot more receptive to change now. Anyways, I missed this. Oh, and the thing about commitment? I obviously didn't like my commitment to Xanga, I'm somewhat withdrawing from Facebook, my posts on my other blog are sporadic at best, and the last time I visited any one internet site in one week, it was Google. Anyway.

I'll leave you with this thought -- the best part of living in NYC is reading the Wall Street Journal and NY Times every morning. When people are supposed to read them. Instead of three days later, like in Iowa. Current events awareness? Check.

Day-1

Sun, 11 Mar 2007 20:02:53 GMT

Today was my page briefing. It was quite different than I expected ... fairly relaxed. The other pages (session one) came to sit in the legislators' chairs and listen to our "briefing." The sergeant-at-arms and his assistant conducted the briefing. It took about 2 hrs, and then we wandered around with the other pages for 15 min. The Capitol is more than dead on Sunday ... even during the winter it is busy, but I saw one non-page or House worker today. And while I was walking out with the other new pages, I met the page that you IC people know ... I don't recall her name. She said that you told her I was a homeschooled genius? Seriously ... knock it off. One of the other new pages did FPS for a while, and was just getting back into it this year. She said, "You're one of those homeschoolers?" I was like ... yeah, we're the ones who stand up when our teams win at state. Which is a lot in the past four years. I kinda felt bad ... it would be strange if we competed against her at state.

Anyways, I got my uniform. The pants are more tan than grey, and instead of a maroon and blue blazer, we only got blue. At least my ties still work. I start tomorrow at 8 AM ... and I still have no idea what I'm doing. It's gonna be great.

The pages said that there is free food almost every day ... a free breakfast, sometimes free lunch. I like that. A lot.

The weekend leading up to today was good as well ... I evaluated FPS packets until my mind melted ... but my paycheck will be well worth it.

I'll keep you guys posted in the days to come ... stay tune.

Foundations of Founders

Thu, 01 Mar 2007 15:43:58 GMT

Guess who got a call from New York City last night?

Guess who got a $40K scholarship?

Guess who is going to the Empire State Building for school?

The King's College

Mon, 26 Feb 2007 17:34:04 GMT

This weekend has been one of the greatest of my life. Honestly. For those of you not aware, I took a Thursday-Monday (today) trip to New York City to participate in the Founder's Scholarship for the King's College. This scholarship, in the order of $10K annually, is awarded to five students out of 37 that chose to attend. The weekend also provided a chance for myself and my parents, both of whom attended, to determine what King's was really like.

I come away amazed. The King's College, or TKC from henceforth, has people that I love to be around. By that I mean people who are always looking for new ideas, people who love to learn, people who want to make a difference. There are only 200 or so people currently attending TKC, but every person, despite their varied backgrounds, wants to change and improve the world. Even better that they work from a Judeo-Christian worldview ... but there is no requirement for students regarding theological principles. Apparently, self-proclaimed paganists, atheists, Catholics and Protestants have all attended, but those without a pervasive subscription to Christian thought often leave after several semesters. Anyways, the people are all smart, wonderful, kind, everything I could want. The Empire State Building for my school, and the world for my "playground."

I will post a synopsis of the weekend, probably at my Blogger site. No need for you to bore yourself with the details. Suffice to say that the competition really brought all of us Founder's students closer together, even though we were competing against each other. And I think that TKC may be first on my list now, above Grove City. It is a very compelling environment -- I hope that I can capitalize on it.

Heard there was ice back home ... stay safe, folks.

Saturday, February 17, 2007

Sat, 17 Feb 2007 14:54:21 GMT

Hollywood is a place where people from Iowa mistake each other for stars.
- Fred Allen

How true.

Blathering on Bloggering

Thu, 15 Feb 2007 23:21:28 GMT

After many seconds of deep pondering, I have determined to resolve a new course of action. Since my habitational experiences in Des Moines (my Pageship, be it as it may) will be filled with new and exciting events, daily perhaps, I have begun another blogging account at http://legiscrusader.blogspot.com . The Blogger.com account will be for the more political of my future experiences and discoveries, while I will retain my Xanga for the personal revelations.

I have begun early to give myself a feel for the process ... so I will try dual publishing, see how it works. My time can surely stretch a little more.

The first post is already up ... check it out, if you have time. I'd hate for nobody to read my hard work of five minutes.

Stay funky.

Google Q

Sat, 10 Feb 2007 19:10:42 GMT

I detest life-insurance agents; they always argue that I shall some day die, which is not so.
- Stephen Leacock

It's a balmy 12º outside .... this is good!

I work all day today ... this is bad!

I have many good books waiting for me at home ... this is really good!

More later. I promise on my to-do list, which governs my life.

Guileless Corporate Plugging

Thu, 01 Feb 2007 22:50:13 GMT

Or GCP, as I like to call it. Basically, I got involved in this site called cenimar.com. The idea is that you bet money (pretend money) on future events, trying to predict the future and become insanely famous among the geek/political community. The point is that I'm running out of funds to buy stocks, at least until tomorrow. So if I put this cenimar.com link on my site, I get free money! More stocks, more fame. And all you have to do is read it - or click on it.

No, seriously, its a cool program, and I don't get paid for saying that. Make sure you have time to get away from the computer, though ... otherwise surrender your life.

Its still cold (outside).

SATs put me flat on my back

Sat, 27 Jan 2007 19:56:36 GMT

Why do we pronounce SAT S-A-T? Why not sat? Is "sat" copyrighted? "Sat" could rhyme and make happy ditties for the College Board to profit from.

Anyways, today I took 'em. I'm not going to say it was easy, but I'm alive. Tired, but alive. Tired because I had to get up at 5:15 to drive to a test site 2 hrs away. Alive ... well, you know. Its been a long day.

Moving into the second round of the Founder's Scholarship at King's -- now I have to use some combination of multimedia and oratory to create a persuasive presentation to the judges regarding my essay (remember, the one about ESB?). We go to NYC the 23rd of February (Friday), and get back the following Monday, the 26th. Right after FPS Regionals, for you calendar-savvy homedogs.

The problem is that there are 40 semi-finalists. How do I make my content stand out from theirs (think of the monotony!)? I have some ideas involving in-game recording ... I'll keep you updated. Feel free to post all of your creative ideas as well -- I will steal make them my own using proper attribution.

Its cold outside ... like "the cold front sweeping in over my heart."

Let it ... snow?

Tue, 16 Jan 2007 19:57:17 GMT

So it finally snowed. We hadn't had a persistent (overnight) snowfall of more than 2 inches since December 2005. But disaster is now averted, all those junkies got their *fresh* snow-cone fix.

It finally feels like January, for better or for worse.

The winter days (stay inside or freeze) often put me into a reflective mood. Yesterday I was thinking about impact. How much of an impact will I have on people around me? How impactful (?) have I already been? Was it a good impact, or bad?

Probably the most obvious people that I have impacted (for better, for worse) are family. I wonder how they have impacted me? How much of my personality is influenced, even determined, by my family and friends? How much of my identity is determined by me, and how much of it is out of my control?

I love reading autobiographies and memoirs because of this concept. It is interesting to see how people consider themselves ... and then read other history to see how the people of their time and the people of today evaluate them. All the different perspectives combine to create one person. Amazing.

Now, reflecting on my reflection, I realize that too much introspective analysis either provokes endless philosophical reasoning or depression. I hope its an early spring.

And now for something completely different: The Larch (not really). I was accepted to one of my top two colleges -- The King's College in NYC. We might (parentals + me) fly out there in late Feburary, before the Page thing starts. It is a really neat college, really different. Campus Crusade purchased the charter and moved it to the Empire State Building, and they really have a strong purpose. It will be cool to see how it works out. More expensive than GCC, though.